Stress Eater

If you noticed earlier, I did not post my lunch.  I was at a luncheon with new students and their family members and felt a little odd taking pictures of my food.  I ate a whole wheat roll with 2 pieces of gouda cheese, lettuce, tomato, and a little mayo.  I also consumed massive amounts of Caesar salad.   Massive.

After my consumption of this cookie

I ate.  And ate.  I started with a chocolate crunch rice cake – I have developed a love for these things.

An unpictured apple AND two more of the cookies I had enjoyed early. 

Am I mad at myself for all I ate today.  Yes.  Is there anything I can do about it now?  No.  It is a very stressful time right now in my job and I recognize that I am a stress eater.  Also, today I spent a lot of time at my desk doing mindless editing.  Very tedious, very time consuming, very frustrating.  I ate to keep my mind occupied. 

Is my stress eating something I am working on – absolutely.  But I also realize it is something I cannot focus on now – I need to get through the next 7 days (I will be working every day straight for 13 days – I am only on day 5).  The next few days, my hours will be crazy – for example, tomorrow I am working from 3:30 pm until probably about 10 pm.  Not so normal. 

I am going to do my best to run next Monday and Tuesday to relieve some stress.  Next Sunday and Monday and I want to try to think of ways I can avoid this excessive stress eating. 

Ok…off my soapbox. 

On to more exciting things….like more food!

Today is the end of the New Recipe Challenge I started on Sunday.  Today was the last new recipe I had to try – Southwest Polenta and Vegetables.  On Wednesday I had prepped some of the veggies for this dish – I cut the onion, minced the garlic and diced two peppers.  The early prep meant this dinner came together pretty quickly. 

I followed this dinner pretty closely except I did not use any zucchini and instead used two peppers – a red and yellow one. 

Look at this delicious mixture cooking on the stovetop

I used frozen corn (I forgot to buy corn at the farmers’ market earlier in the week).

In the casserole dish on top of the sliced polenta

We then topped this mixture with some reduced fat cheddar cheese.

Similar to the recipe, we served this dish with sautéed spinach. 

I sautéed the spinach in the same skilled that I cooked the veggie mixture in – hence the pieces of veggies mixed in with the spinach.

With a piece of the polenta with some veggies

This meal is excellent and makes A LOT.  Matt enjoyed it and gave it the ultimate approval – he would make it again.  I broke up the polenta into little pieces and enjoyed some in most bites.  The cheese and spices gave this dish some great flavors without being too overpowering.  The peppers and corn were sweet and proved to be a nice contrast to the tomato, onion and garlic.  Loved it. 

For dessert, we made the Banana Soft Serve I have been seeing a lot of lately.  I have been freezing bananas for a few weeks now and had a nice stash set aside for this dessert. 

We had some difficulty with the food processor and had to stop it a few times to break up the large banana chunks but we persevered and enjoyed an amazing treat.  

With some melted chocolate chips drizzled on top.  OMG this was absolutely amazing.  Both Matt and I could not believe this contained only one ingredient (well minus the chocolate on top) – banana.  How simple yet delicious.  The “soft serve” was airy and very rich – in a good way.  How could you go wrong with bananas and chocolate.  I’m already imagining how to top this next time…I’m seeing melted Soynut butter in my future…

I need to get some sleep tonight – its going to be a long day tomorrow – especially in the middle of Tropical Storm Danny!